Is your trust in science based on faith or based on science?

What I mean is this: how much do you actually know about the science most atheists parrot? Most atheists know as little science as most Christians know as little theology. Just as a Christian trusts his priest to tell him what he believes, an atheist trusts scientists with a Ph.D. tacked to their name to tell them what they believe. But how many times have the scientists turned out to be wrong? I only ask this because it seems this is central to the problem that most atheists have. They are repulsed by the phrase “believe” – they are addicted instead to the phrase “know”. But honestly, do you really know, or are you just believing what you’re told? I would like to remind you that in the 1970′s the scientists of the day were seriously concerned that we were about to enter an ice age, and less than 30 years later they are now convinced Earth is about to turn into a desert.

Unless you’ve observed something yourself, or observed and interpreted the evidence yourself and drew your own conclusions, you are just as guilty as faith as any religious person.

@G - Just read your profile, and you are an Atheist, and very young, and English is not your first language. So bravo for coming onto this site. Your mistake was not proclaiming that you are in fact an Atheist. If you are, in fact, an Atheist, I will forgive you. :)

I dont have the time to do all the reading and research so I have to trust certain people as sources of information and I pretty much branch off from there. I trust Richard Dawkins because he once had the title of University of Oxford's Professor for Public Understanding of Science Thats an amazing responsibility. There are a lot of people watching him waiting for him to slip up so he better be right.. Steven Hawking keeps us up to date with all things E=mc2. Brian Cox and his mates tell us whats going on at CERN.

I am willing to bet I know more about science than many Christians know about Christianity. I am willing to bet I know more about Christianity than some Christians. I am by no means the smartest or most well-informed atheist here.

I don't know how I would prove any of that or why it would matter. I know enough of science to be able to not fall for religious pseudo-scientific bull. I do place trust in science but as others have said that is not faith. It is trust build out of tangible results. Let's see... I had a set of medical symptoms that led me to seek medical attention. the doctor examined me, did some blood tests and determined what exactly was wrong with me. He prescribed some medicine for me and Bingo! There were religious people in my life at the time who were telling me to pray harder, put mind over matter, etc. If I had not gone to a doctor I would eventually have stopped functioning altogether.

That is just one instance in my actual life where science clearly made sense and helped me. Science - 1, Religion - 0.

When science is wrong it re-evaluates and moves on, when religion is wrong it burns a bunch of people alive, and spreads more lies to cover it's mistake. Science is a way of examining questions, religion is just a bunch of invalid pre-produced answers designed to hault the search for truth.

Oh, @HankHell, it's not that easy. When science is wrong, typically a bunch of older scientists reject or even deny tenure to younger ones with newfangled ideas, conferences break into competing camps, there are lots of loud arguments and all the rest. For particularly important things, large groups of scientists get together and formulate consensus statements (Copenhagen Interpretation of quantum mechanics, the IPCC on climate change, etc.), but there are still dissenters.

Your understanding of religion is similarly naive. At least in my faith, things proceed much as they do with science. Older theists reject younger ones with new ideas, people form camps, there are lots of loud arguments. For particularly important things, large groups get together and formulate consensus statements (ex. Vatican II), but there are still dissenters.

Both religion and science are human endeavors, subject to all of the foibles and "personalities" and politics and errors of humans, while also (hopefully) honestly seeking the Truth (or at least a better model ;) ).

Yeah, except the theists all claim to be getting their intel from the creator of the universe. If they could just admit they were holding their own opinions, the ones to which they had themselves been indoctrinated, then perhaps their position wouldn't seem so hypocritical.

No, @Heather, you claim that we think we're getting our intel from the Creator of the universe. Not many of us theists would make that claim, and almost all of those we would immediately dismiss as fruit loops. The few remaining we would wait a century or so for evidence and argument to develop and then perhaps consider them saints. ;)